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HOME --> CLASS MAMMALIA
--> ORDER RODENTIA
--> SUBORDER MYOMORPHA
--> SUPERFAMILY Muroidea
--> FAMILY Muridae
--> SUBFAMILY Murinae
GENUS Colomys
| Author: | Thomas and Wroughton, 1907. | | Citation: | Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., ser. 7, 19: 379. | | Type Species: | Colomys goslingi Thomas and Wroughton, 1907. | | Comments: | ColomysDivision. Nilopegamys has been included in Colomys (Hayman, 1966) but was recently separated from it (Kerbis Peterhans and Patterson, 1995). Using dental characteristics, Misonne (1969) placed Colomys in a Parapodemus group of his Lenothrix-Parapodemus Division with an inferred relationship to Malacomys, but that affinity is currently rejected (Dieterlen, 1983; E. Lecompte, 2002b; results of our research). Molar occlusal patterns of Colomys resemble those of the African Zelotomys (Misonne, 1969, and verified by our observations), a shared-derived morphological feature concordant with results from phylogenetic analyses of complete mtDNA cytochrome b sequences (Lecompte et al., 2002b) and nuclear IRBP gene sequences (Lecompte, 2003), which indicates Colomys to be sister to Zelotomys. Those molecular data align Colomys and Zelotomys with Myomyscus verreauxii in a monophyletic cluster embedded in a larger group composed of Praomys, Mastomys, Hylomyscus, Heimyscus, other Myomyscus, and Stenocephalemys; partial 16S rRNA mtDNA sequences also associated Colomys with Praomys, Mastomys, and Hylomyscus (Fadda et al., 2001a). |
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